


When on your journeys you meet a countryman

by Project0506



Series: Soft Wars [98]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Brothers, Clones, Gen, gen - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:48:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24735655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Project0506/pseuds/Project0506
Summary: The Shebse raised Rex, but it turns out that most CCs haven't ever much interacted with CTs before.
Series: Soft Wars [98]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1683775
Comments: 83
Kudos: 537





	When on your journeys you meet a countryman

It is the most amiable kidnapping Rex ever been in, and the most affable kidnapper.

“Not that I’ve had that many,” Rex clarifies and quarters his vegemeal and quarters it again into easily swallowable blobs. “Just the one in escape and evasion.” Unless he wants to count every time he’s been transported against his will, which ups the count by all the Shebse, and one Doom. “Six if you count brothers,” he corrects. “But you certainly win most congenial.”

“That’s just babysitting,” his tablemate claims. “And I wouldn’t call this a kidnapping either.”

Rex is somewhat glad to see the slightly manic tilt to his eyes has started calming to match his blandly pleasant smile. His grip on his plast multitensil is less a white-knuckled uncomfortably-not-distant-enough threat of a stabbing. The multitensils they use aren’t especially lethal, but Rex wasn’t looking forward to trying to pick plast shards out of himself.

“Kidnappers in my experience rarely do.”

Keeli makes a considering sound at that, but notably doesn’t disagree.

He’s has set upon his portion with familiar rapid, dainty bites that hold the balance between quelling the post-training demands of the stomach as quickly as possible, and having to actually taste any of the nutrient squares. He’s a starch first man. Rex is the exact opposite; he has the starch last to cut the bitter aftertaste of the vegemeal. It’s the only way to make the twice-weekly dessert actually feel like a treat afterwards, and not just a vinegary penance.

Keeli chews optimistically on a dense blob of veg. “That’s a pretty circular bit of logic,” he says once he’s wrestled it down.

Rex raises a challenging eyebrow and doesn’t bother to comment. There’s no argument as persuasive as a demonstration.

He braces his hand on the table and slowly pushes his seat back. It wasn’t entirely thought through: they shoe the chairs with little rubber feet to keep them from slipping on the smooth tile floor. The shriek of their protest is excruciating in the roots of his teeth.

Vode dotted through the cavernous mess hall lift exhausted eyes their way, then drop them back to their own trays when curiosity proves far too much work. Today was an active one and few have the energy for more than sitting right now.

Rex pushes back, and he only gets about six inches from the table before the chair stops. He glances down: ankles hook around the chair legs, and those ankles gamely shriek his chair right back into place until his stomach nigh presses against the table edge’s fillet. He could probably still wriggle out, given time and will, but he’s not been immune to the exhaustion of the day.

Keeli isn’t either. Even that tiny movement has visibly worn him down.

“I can see where your impression is coming from,” Keeli admits. He taps a foot against Rex’s in faux-genuine apology. “But a pretty important part of a kidnapping is the _removal_ of the person against their will. I haven’t moved you anywhere, I'm just making sure you don't leave. If anything, this is actually a hostage situation.”

“So long as we’re clear.”

“We are. Eat your paste. It is apparently filled with things you need.”

Rex eats his paste. They’ve upped his protein content again, and the liberal pour of powdered peppers can’t fully hide the milky chalk.

That’s a thought. There’s a visible dusting of pepper on top. Between the protein and the vegemeal, he can probably get a makeshift lachrymator agent mixed up. Buy himself some time to make an escape. He’ll save that for an emergency. He isn’t sure he has the energy to throw it.

The truth is, the clatter of the edge of a tray slapping his, juddering his portion and collapsing the last pretense of his protein square’s attempt to hold together, had snapped him out of the same latemeal fugue that has settled heavily over all the students in mess. It’s been a long few tendays, and tonight his reflexes are sharper than his reasoning. He’d kept himself from wearing the last half of his enriched water, but hadn’t been able to parse much beyond that for several silent seconds. By the time he had, the vod had already taken his silence as permission to sit.

It says a lot, that it’s the most interesting thing that’s happened to Rex since last Taungsday’s sparring session where Commander Colt had taken the time to demonstrate every single point in Rex’s guard that needed work. Maybe more interesting than that. People spar against him all the time.

There’s a sweeping susuruss of voices as another range wanders in free for the day. Clusters of ARC candidates stumble by propped up against each other and intent only on staying upright enough to shovel down nutrients. More than one drapes themselves across a table and promptly doze, portion congealing to even lower palatability. Someone waves at Rex’s hostage taker, yawns and does a double take at Rex himself halfway through. The sputter is amusingly undignified.

“And mark,” Keeli mutters. His smirk is one of a man brilliantly pleased with himself.

“I’m starting to feel used,” Rex decides. A vod wanders by, stares hard between the two of them and flashes a thumbs up.

“That’s fair, considering I’m using you.”

Rex would have had to have been deaf to miss the rumblings of The Other CT In ARC Training on his periphery. He’d ignored them, brushed off the questions about them and turned down offers of introductions of one sort or another. It hadn’t been important, he’d thought. He’d already checked it wasn’t someone he knew, and he’s friendly enough with the students on his range that he’s hardly lacking for socialization.

Why should one unknown CT matter to Rex? He’s here for training.

Keeli it seems had thought a bit differently. Or perhaps had different persuasions, he’s not said. His body language gives away far more than he speaks. Here we are, the set of his shoulders scream. Notice us interacting. Stop asking about it now.

His even mien never breaks. Rex envies his calm.

The room swells and yet their table fills noticeably slower than others. When it does, there’s still a measurable bubble of space around the two of them.

Commander Neyo. _Commander_ _Neyo_ slips in to the cafeteria a customary half-step in front of Commander Bacara, glances between the two of them and nods seriously. He steers Commander Bacara to a seat on the other side of the room.

Rex watches them go, fascinated. “Do CCs think a concentration of CT-ness is contagious?”

Keeli scoffs, and it’s the first shift of expression Rex has seen from him. He shades faintly mocking for no more than a second before he buries it. “They don’t want to interrupt our sacred trooper bonding rituals.”

“Is _that_ what we’re doing?”

Rex gives up on food. His wrists ache from dozens of repetitions of strikes and sawing anymore at this is the thing Rex wants second least to do right now. Cody isn’t in this latemeal module to stare blankly at him for skipping half a meal. He’ll grab a protein drink to make up the difference.

“We’re an arcane group,” Keeli explains. “Us cute little CTs have such strange traditions and CCs would just feel awful intruding.”

It’s not quite bitterness there, haunting the spaces between his words, but it could be.

Rex thinks of his brothers, of the way he’d asked 17 to swap ranges to be able to stand apart from them. He thinks of how they were disappointed, but every one of them knew why he’d done it without him ever having to offer a single word of explanation. He thinks of how they’ve given him the space he’d silently asked for.

He thinks of how they’d always tried to give him the space he’d needed to grow, even when it meant trying to balance that with their own need to make sure he was safe.

“They mean well,” he murmurs and can feel the truth of it.

“They can then shove their means right up-” Keeli clenches his teeth, once, and releases them almost instantly. “I’m an adult,” he says, words quiet enough that they barely leave his throat. “If there was ever a time I needed _keeping_ , it’s long gone.”

They’ll have to disagree on that. It’s easier for Rex to stand independent if he knows he can ask for help if he thought he needed it. He can understand Keeli though, at least a little. It had taken a long time for Rex to understand why the Shebse were the way they were, at first.

“So instead you’re keeping me hostage to ward off nosy CCs.”

“It’s only polite to give us good friends a chance to catch up. I’m aware,” he says to Rex’s look, the driest thing on Kamino since the atmo densification formed the water layer most of five billion years ago. “That we just met. But we’re both CTs, and command track. Obviously we _must_ know each other.”

There are hundreds of CCs. There are millions of CTs. The skewed frame of reference may not be entirely the CCs fault. “But does that mean we’d be friends?” Rex ponders. “We could be competitors.”

Keeli snickers and the wry twist of his grin falls back to genuine. “Adding some drama? I like it. Of course, I’d be better, and you’d be making the valiant attempt to keep up.”

Rex glares flatly. “I want to like you vod, I really do.”

The other CT laughs, a quickfire bright thing in the evening gray of the cafeteria and Rex congratulates himself on work done well. Again, heads bob up in search of the source and fall away when the want to know collapses under the effort it takes to crane upright.

Vode closest to them grant distracted, indulgent smiles Rex notices. Like a pet that’s done something particularly adorable, he can’t help but think. Bly was a lot like that at first. It had taken weeks of sudden tackles to work him out of it.

There are things Rex would tolerate from the Shebse. Other CCs don’t have that kind of privilege.

“I’m trying to decide if I should be insulted,” he muses.

“I’m trying to _be_ insulted. But they’re all so karking earnest, it’s like kicking the massiff that fetched your shoes for you. Or in this case, eagerly validated your combat prowess. Even though they know we all get the same karking combat training.”

There’s a little voice in the back of Rex’s head that hisses ‘language’. It sounds distressingly like Ponds.

“But CTs are littler,” he mutters, “and thus need to be parented.”

But what if there are _two_ CTs? Which one of them needs more taking care of?

Keeli smiles. Rex has known him for about a half hour, and he doesn’t trust that smile. It’s too pleasant, too trust-me, too blandly reasonable. There’s a little-brother’s own special brand of humiliation brewing in the corners of that smile. Rex has been a little brother for a very long time, he recognizes the instinct immediately. There are two CTs. If one needs more taking care of, the other gets a bit less smother.

There’s only one thing to do: strike first.

“Lucky for me, you’re around to look distractingly waifish.” He mimics Wolffe’s stone-faced sincerity and sips at his mineral-enhanced water.

Keeli’s smile twitches, threatens to widen.

Their bubble of privacy has shrank by necessity as wave after wave of vode staggered in in search of latemeal. They have an audience, and every member of said audience is trying desperately not to be a spectator. Nearly every. There’s one Commander Rex doesn’t know who looks ready to whip out a ‘pad and take observation notes. The rest try to respect their small cluster, haphazard as it is and set up smack in the middle of a public-use room.

It really shows, the differences between people trained four to an instructor as opposed to a hundred twenty to a class. CCs in general haven’t had as much practice with selective ignoring, it looks like.

“Waifish?” Keeli inquires politely, eyes afire.

“Waifish,” Rex repeats with no trace of remorse and more than a smattering of glee. He has a little-brother’s practice of projecting; with the right tone his voice can travel for miles. “Rangy. Slight. Are you eating all your assigned protein, vod’ika?”

Rex knows he isn’t the largest. They’re mostly all the same height bar some genetic anomalies, but different specialties pack on muscle differently. Rex is billeted for mid-range and small arms. Only Scouts tend to be narrower at the shoulders than he is. Keeli, Rex thinks, is likely _also_ small arms the way he’s shaped for it. It’s personal experience that tells Rex just where to hit for maximum annoyance.

Keeli carefully lines his multitensil up against one short edge of his tray and delicately folds his hands. “Which would you say is your least favorite limb?”

“We can’t _brawl_ in front of the CCs, you’d upset them.”

Someone sputters. Keeli rubs at his lip to hide a smile. “Good catch. A shoot-off then. Advanced Small Arms range. Loser is demoted to youngest of our year.”

Behind Rex someone curses. “Is _that_ how they figure it?” they mutter. “I _knew_ the CT numbers didn’t make sense.”

It’ll be all over the CCs before the contest is over, that CTs compete to determine who is youngest. It’s glorious in its simplicity. Keeli is a troll after Rex’s own heart.

He'll spend a little more time admiring the technique when he's not quite so _eager_ for a competition.

Keeli prods at his shoulder, prods him right from his seat. There’s anticipation curling in his hands and bouncing in his step that matches Rex’s own. He’s small arms for sure; Rex knows the lines a 17 holster rubs into the thighs and hips and waist and backs of blacks very well. When was the last time he’d been challenged on the range? Not a lesson or an assessment, just the thrill of skill against skill? There’s a hunger that’s desperate for a contest, ignored too long.

He grins, a little tooth a little wild, a lot anticipation. “Do remember that if you make me leave, it’s officially kidnapping.”

“Only if I lose,” Keeli claims. He takes Rex’s tray, stacks them his on top to hide the remnants of Rex’s half-finished meal. “If I’m your older brother, it’s just babysitting.”

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